I have about 50 minutes until the 11 o'clock news...just enough time to answer a few of the questions many of you have e-mailed me. It seems the burning question you have is what is a typical day like? And when do I ever see my husband?

My life is just as nuts as yours. Trust me. I wake up with Ryan (that could be any time, unfortunately) but it's usually around 8AM. I hear Jack and Michael giggling in Ryan's room...so I stagger in to find them poking their feet through the slats of Ryan's crib. I told you. The kid'll chew on ANYTHING. Yeah. Nice image. I take the boys downstairs and let them goof around as I make breakfast. Mike usually helps me out by giving Ryan a bottle, and Jack nags me to watch "a show." He's a TV nut. A tough thing to be in my house because we never turn the thing on.

I'm serious about meal time. It's the one thing my folks didn't screw around with. Family meal time. We sit down as a family on most mornings -- Joe, too -- because he doesn't have to be at the hospital until later in the morning. We clean up and I make dinner. Okay. I'll at least thaw something out, okay? I'm hurting for easy and tasty recipes, so if you have something your kids love, give a sister a break and send it to me IMMEDIATELY. I'll reciprocate. Promise.

Lately, the mornings have held pretty boring, but totally necessary, jobs. I already talked about the whole toy cleanup and organization. Today it was clothes. Giving Jack Mike's hand-me-downs, getting rid of the crap they've never worn, finding curious stains on clothes I thought were clean but was sorely wrong about... that sort of stuff. I also try to lure Michael into reading to me. He has such a short fuse. (wonder where he gets it.) If he's not perfect immediately at EVERYTHING, he'll mope and quit. Drives me nuts. I've tried every strategy I know of to get him to persevere. So frustrating. Mind you -- this whole time -- Jack's been nagging me to "watch a show." AAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!


We moved into a new home 2 years ago and it seems every month I have a new self-launched project. (I'll post some pictures of the new fireplace we just put in. Doesn't sound exciting -- but you'll love it!) When I get way over my head with one of those "projects" and our checking account needs a break, the boys and I take our schtick outside. We play a lot of baseball in our yard, and we also go to a neighborhood swimming pool where I can be a total freak about the kids leaving the place...uh... alive. Ryan is such a handful. I really have to be in the perfect frame of mind to handle a pool day.

My boys are all nappers. Thank God. I can ususally count on a couple hours a day out of both Michael and Jack -- and an hour here and there 3 times a day out of Ryan. I just started exercising again...destined to get rid of that weird "skin" that I just can't shake since Ryan arrived. If the boys all nap at the same time, I race into the basement for 20 minutes of running (gagging) and 10 minutes of brisk walking. Don't be impressed. I just started. I'd rather have a beer. Trust me.

A lot of days the boys and I are outside doing yard work. We have about 1/3 of an acre -- not a big lot, but big enough. I like to mow the yard, plant flowers, fooster around out there. It's my release, I guess. That -- and cleaning. I have serious issues about messes. Can't deal with them. At all.

Our nanny comes over at 2 -- and that's when I get in the shower for work. I leave the house by 2:45 and get to the station by 3. (Let's not get into the hair talk, okay? A woman e-mailed me tonight telling me she likes it much better long. My response? I'll save that hour of struggling with my curls and spend it with the boys instead. Which is more important again?)

The best part of my work life is being able to come home every night for dinner. That was something I had to have. I come home every night around 7 and the five of us sit down and have dinner together. I give the boys their baths, we read some poems out of a Shel Silverstein book, they goof around with Joe, and I go back to WTAE to work on the 11 o'clock news. I'm home by 11:50 every night...and either in bed or on the treadmill, winding down. I kiss my sleeping sons good night...crawl into bed next to Joe...and it all starts over again.

Sexy? Nope. But I bet it sounds suspiciously like someone else's life. Yours, perhaps?

AHA! It's finally happened! The biggst computer idiot this world has ever seen has posted two pictures. Unreal stuff. I'll forget how to do it tomorrow, of course.

So here's Ryan, almost 8 months old now. Teething. Great. This poor child has had it rough. Six months of colic. More drool than you've ever seen. Now a temperature and gnawing on everything in sight. By the way, if you're one of those parents whose kids slept through the night at two weeks, stand clear. I will hurt you.

I've been getting some e-mails from women especially who seem surprised that I'm just like all of you. Here's my photorgraphic proof. The double whammy on the left? Do rag AND no makeup? Get out. And the other -- squiggling on the bed with Ryan. Between crying fits, of course. I'll get some cute ones of Mike and Jack soon. Isn't it weird when one child is on a growth spurt when the others aren't? Michael must have a hollow leg, he's eating so much. Jack is happy drinking milk and eating nothing. And Ryan just wants to eat my finger. Good to chew on, I 'spose.

Gotta scoot now and get home to give my boys dinner. For those of you who've wondered about my hours now? The greatest part of the this new shift is that I get to go home each night for dinner. Tell me. Does work get any better than that?

I know. I know. I promised to post pictures today. But of what? Pictures of Ryan drooling and crying because he's teething? Or of Michael and Jack beating the tar out of each other because they've been cooped up inside thanks to the rain? Decisions. Decisions. Why is it that taking pictures of your kids becomes an infinitely smaller priority the more children you have? Poor Ryan'll be lucky to even have a scrapbook, at this point.

I'm getting so many e-mails from many of you who can relate to the goings on of my crazy life of lunacy. Stay at home dads. Working moms. Even college kids who check out thepittsburghchannel.com in other states, believe it or not! So let me ask you.... what do you what to know? What do you care about? What are you curious about? Bring it on. I suspect the burning topic I wanted to write about (these huge weeds that grow in the same patch of my lawn every summer -- what are they? How do I get rid of them?) wouldn't turn you on today -- so toss me some softballs here. I'm game if you are!

So our Web Guru, Chris, has been on vacation for the past week. And of course -- during that same week-- this blog site forgot who I was. I couldn't sign in, couldn't post a thing. And I even got some testy e-mails from people -- peeved that I didn't live up to my promise to post more often. Okay. Problem solved. I'm back...and tomorrow I'm going to flirt with posting pictures. I hate computers. So even attempting this is a big thing for me.... stay tuned...

I had the sexy weekend job of organizing the boys' toys and eliminating all the crap stuff (happy meal giveaways, junk from the check-out aisle, silly stocking stuffers) that could kill Ryan. Have you people done this? You have older kids with all sorts of "accessories" and you Gotta Do It. Of course, the deadliest stuff is the stuff Mike and Jack can't bear to part with. Pieces of Transformers they've either lost or taken apart, GI Joe's grenades (what a good idea), marbles, miniature tires, itty bitty Legos. You name it. I had it. And the boys didn't what to get rid of it. I had a full Organization Weekend. It's up there with the weekend you switch your kids clothes around. You know. Summer to Winter. Winter to Summer. 5 to a 6. Shoot me. Somehow, my husband is never "available" during these highly necessary and exceedingly time consuming chores.

And how about this? Gone through your kids toys lately and pulled out everything with dead batteries? That was EVERY SINGLE ELECTRONIC TOY IN MY HOUSE. Remote-controlled cars, a kid's electric guitar. Two keyboards. A synthesizer (didn't know we had that.) Karaoke machine. Juke box. Light sabres. Flashlights. Even that $10 piece of crap Elmo Wand the boys talked me into three years ago when Sesame Street Live came to town. All the batteries -- kaput. You would have thought it was Christmas morning. New juice = new entertainment. Hours they spent...huddled together in the basement...making the worst racket and loving every stinking minute of it. Kind of reminds me of our family's annual pilgrimmage to Disney World. We don't go for Disney. We go for The Pool. The greatest, most incredible, kid-friendly place on earth. They love it. And I love watching them love it. But it is exhausting. Keeping your kids alive there is like surviving a water park. They have no idea that danger lurks around every bend. And there's no way you can relax because of it. It's a wonderful thing to enjoy your childrens' happiness more than your own. It's also a wonderful thing when your kids get old enough to appreciate that they're still alive today...because you were a tireless maniac who followed them wherever they went. Whew. I'm tired just thinking about it.

Well -- I'm going to post this now and get on with the news. I'll fiddle with my digital camera tomorrow...and don't be surprised if my next post is titled -- Why I hate Cameras. There's no way it's going to be easy.

So I've officially switched from the morning shift to nights. Not so bad. Except for the NBA. You gotta love working 8 hours on a newscast that only four people watch (two of them sober) at 1:30 AM after a playoff game. Most of you have, by now, realized that something's going on, right? Andrew isn't just filling in on the morning show anymore. I officially bequeathed to him my monster sized Channel 4 Action News coffee mug. And when Demetrius makes the brew? You want a full cup.

I've gone from drinking coffee at 5 AM to slugging cups at 8 AM, noon, and again at 4 PM. My mother in law insists my day is "much longer" now. It isn't. I actually get seven hours sleep. Just not sequentially.

I've found the key is being organized. (And not melting down when your kids try to flood the house with a poopy, paper-stuffed toilet. Nice.)

I make dinner at 8AM these days, watch virtually no TV, spend more time cleaning and doing laundry than anything glamorous or exciting, and I love every minute. My sons seem to be adjusting, too.

At some point, I'll post pictures. If you recall the Baby Blog, I had a few... uh..."issues." I hate computer stuff and anything electronic. I've had an i-pod for 2 months now, but it's still in its plastic clamshell -- unopened. The thought of reading instructions and actually programming anything other than an alarm clock makes my head hurt. I don't even know how to program the clock, come to think of it.

Got a voice message from a woman today about my hair. She was so pleased I finally "tamed it." Lovely. I'd love to get a haircut, but my guy is booked until next week. And when I do go? I have to take 3 sons with me. Wait. Let me emphasize that. Three sons. Is it any wonder we moms look the way we do? Can you believe someone actually wrote me once (anonymously, of course) to tell me I had elf-like ears? ELF LIKE EARS. Who does that? And what do you suppose THEY look like?

That's my stream-of-consciousness right now. The web mastermind here at the station says he wants me to write a post every day. That people will care and find it interesting. I don't know about that. Wait until I figure out how to do pictures. THAT you'll want to see!!

I remember some of the things that used to freak me out me as a kid. Getting zipped up in my sleeping bag. Creepy episodes of Fantasy Island. Having my sister jump out at me in the dark. You know. Fun stuff like that. Had I ever known the true frights of parenthood, I would've embraced Tattoo and Mr. York with open arms.


We live in a great neighborhood with zillions of kids. My neighbors and I kind of share backyards because there's no fencing, so it's easy for my older boys, Michael and Jack, to slip out of my sight. And that makes me nervous. Especially considering that the people two homes down have a pool. And it's not locked. And my kids like to swim. Michael can swim. Just not well. Jack THINKS he can swim.
But he can't. And Jack is afraid of nothing. Work with me here.



On most days, I let the boys run around outside as I make dinner...and when we're close to sitting down at the table, I whistle a special whistle and they come running. Okay, they usually come running. All right. They complain and whine and kick the ground...but they still come running. Not the other day. Mike came running. But no Jack.


Where's Jack? Michael gave me the I Don't Know sound and shrugged his shoulders. Not good. I ran outside and started calling his name. His Formal Name. No answer. My heart started to race. I ran to the backyard. The side yard. Searched the front and the street. Across the street. Down the street. Now I'm screaming his name. Michael is running around with me. Neighbors start looking out their windows. A few come outside to see what's going on. And then...after -- I kid you not - 10 AGONIZING minutes -- Jack appears from a bush in the neighbors yard and sheepishly walks toward me, head down. If I was loud before, I was screaming then. He was there the whole time. Watching me freak out. Scared of getting in trouble. And boy, did he. In front of God and everyone, I grabbed the little crapper and dragged him into the house and proceeded to yell until I had tears in my eyes.



It wasn't my best demonstration of fine parenting, but I challenge any mother or father, or grandparent or caretaker, for that matter, to handle that heart-pounding fear in a well-organized fashion. The thought of his little body, laying lifeless at the bottom of a pool wakes me up at night. And some day -- when Jack has children of his own -- he'll understand. He'll know that Mommy WAS crazy, sure, but that she tried tirelessly every day just to keep him and his brothers alive.


Sheesh. Just another relaxing day at home.